Green Options

The general idea is fantastic, 1,000 plots could provide the British population with 2.6 million lettuces per year or 50,000 sacks of potatoes, as well as reducing food miles, improving land use, and giving individuals healthful exercise in the fresh air.

When times are tough, the tough plant victory gardens!

[Digging a Victory Garden. Creative Commons photo by Tavis Ford]

Last Thursday, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack began turning a stretch of pavement at the Department of Agriculture into a garden. They dedicated the land on the 200th anniversary of the USDA founder’s birth: Abraham Lincoln. Not only are they working on a garden at USDA headquarters, but Vilsack announced plans to start community gardens at all USDA offices across the globe! Is this the Obama administration’s answer to petitions from Eat the View and the WHO Farm on Change.org?

GreenTalk Radio host Sean Daily talks with Jules Dervaes of Path to Freedom. Path to Freedom  is a grassroots, family operated, viable urban homesteading project established to promote a simpler and more fulfilling lifestyle and reduce one family’s “footprint” on the [...]

The urban chicken movement is growing as more and more folks try to move away from factory farmed food and towards self-sufficiency.

[Creative Commons photo by Linda N.]

Why Chickens?
Chickens are pretty low-maintenance. Once you have your coop set up, you just have to make sure they’re fed, watered, and get to run around outside. Most people who raise their own chickens do so for the eggs, not the meat. Instead of buying eggs from a factory farm or from hundreds of miles away, urban chicken owners benefit from a cheap, local, reliable source of protein. Chicken poop is also a great fertilizer for your garden!

It seems that self-sufficiency and raising your own food is winning increasing approval from officialdom in the U.S., with Falmouth, Maine, possibly becoming the next town to OK the keeping of chickens in residential areas.

The Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram reports that the Falmouth Town Council expects to vote next month on a zoning change that would allow backyard poultry-keeping in neighborhoods throughout town. Currently, only four parts of Falmouth have the OK to raise chickens in residential areas.

An editor I worked with long ago who had lived through the Great Depression once told me her secret for surviving hard times: Be a jack of all trades. The more you can do, she explained, the better your chances of being able to eke out a living, no matter what.

Well, the way the economy’s going lately, it seems like it’s time to return to that can-do spirit. One man in central Florida has beaten many of us to the punch.

If a book contains the word “Bible” in its title, the author is often claiming a measure of authority over the subject. It’s a little pretentious, and really annoying, when a book comes out called The Car Buyer’s and Leaser’s Negotiating Bible or The Screenwriter’s Bible.

So when a book came out touting itself as “the Bible” of green living, I was a little put off. But when I read more about The Self-Sufficientish Bible, I noticed that this one was different. By adding “ish,” the authors are making the statement that self-sufficiency is not something easily accomplished with a few simple rules.

Andy and Dave, Britain’s green twins, advocate a fun and positive approach to environmentalism, and understand that the thought of adjusting every aspect of our lives is overwhelming and possibly offputting. Hence self-sufficientish. If you don’t have the space or time to be totally self-reliant, but crave creative ideas for recycling, growing organic vegetables and establishing an environmentally friendly home office, this is the book for you.

Very short and very simple. I am very envious.